Pratte-Shaw Campaign Speech

CUSHING CENTER — Matthew Shaw ’11 delivered the following remarks on Tuesday evening in the Cushing Center lobby. He is running for Student Government Association vice president, alongside Ashley Pratte ’11, who is running for S.G.A. president. These remarks were also posted on their campaign Facebook page.

We are Ashley Pratte and Matt Shaw, running for Student Government president and vice president. After much discussion and deliberation we decided to announce our candidacy for these esteemed positions. Since May of last year we had been debating with the idea of running for these seats due to our hesitancy to leave vacant seats in our class council. We left with hopes not only to continue to better our class but SGA as a whole. As president and vice president of our class we believe that we are prepared to fulfill the roles left behind by the outgoing administration. Throughout our time here at St. A’s, we have taken on many leadership roles and have become highly involved in the community. These roles include Resident Assistant, Orientation Leader, SBA leader, Resident Hall Council member, NHIOP Ambassador, and Student Activities Program Coordinator. These various involvement opportunities have enhanced our ability to connect with the students as well as the administration, which will be vital to making any changes within the college.

If elected our administration would serve as the voice of the students. We may not know all the issues of this school, but with your help we will be better equipped to tackle any challenges and concerns that arise among the student population. While there are many things that we would like to accomplish there are a few key items that we plan to address. First, we plan to hold weekly meetings with the Director of Student Activities, in order to establish a stronger relationship with the department enabling us to put on more successful events. Second, we will push to form a Commuter Student Council by collaborating with the Multicultural Center. In hopes that the commuter students may have a larger voice as well as become more integrated within the Saint Anselm community. Third, we will collaborate with CAB and Student Activities, as student run organizations, to ensure that all members of the campus are more inclined to participate in different events and activities on campus. Fourth, we will make the issues of the student body a guideline for our agenda because your voices are important and need to be heard. Fifth, we will hold more SGA sponsored events to create more awareness about our organization. As the only student-elected representative body, Student Government’s importance needs to be recognized in order to effectively meet the needs and demands of the students. Under our administration SGA would be dedicated to making its presence felt on campus in order to create a more united student body. Lastly, we will work to establish an Office of Student Involvement here on campus allowing us to work with the administration to ensure more student engagement at athletic events, speakers, and club events. The Office of Student Involvement would include representatives from Student Activities, Meelia Center, Multicultural Center, Campus Ministry, CAB, Athletics, and the Dean of Students Office. This Office would allow for student club cooperation with the administration of the college creating a unique opportunity for the student voice to be heard directly by the administration. Through all of these things we hope to enhance the Student Government Association by working directly with students, major departments, clubs, and organizations.

While these are some of the key topics on our agenda we have further ideas to improve SGA internally. We would like to extend an invitation to representatives from Campus Ministry, the Meelia Center, and the Multicultural Center to participate in our weekly Senate meetings. We feel as though having these organizations represented would help us to establish better relationships with them. This would help us to better serve the needs of all our students rather than the same 10 % who participate in all events. We will hold training sessions for all members involved in Student Government to make sure that everyone is adequately prepared to fulfill the duties of their respective positions.

We will make SGA our first priority. We are involved but, we also realize the importance of the positions, and are willing to make sacrifices to help you, the students of the school to have the best college experience. We realize that we are not the experts and do not know all the issues that pertain to the student population, but we hope to solve as many as we can with input from you and the college administration. We will not make promises that cannot be fulfilled, and will work to push forward a realistic agenda. We know that we can move forward with our ideas and put them into effect. If elected we hope the changes we make will leave a lasting legacy here at Saint Anselm College. Thank you for your time and please vote for us on February 9th and February 10th.

- gww